Week Two, Haliburton School of Art + Design

It's a long weekend here in Ontario, and I've been doing laundry and putting away stuff for the past couple of days. I returned home Friday night after two weeks of teaching in Haliburton at the Haliburton School of Art + Design.

This post is about my second week, in which I had ten brave and eager students join me for a week of learning to liberate themselves from precision quilt making. I showed them five different ways to create free-form quilts. Thankfully someone suggested a photo of the class because last week I completely forgot to take a photo of the group in my dyeing class. From left to right are Shirley, Alison, Judy, Charlotte, Anne, me, Terry, Mary Anne, Kim, Cheryl, and Katharine.

This is just a small sampling of the photos I took. Here, Alison holds up her sample of "flip n' sew curves".

Mary Anne finished all the blocks for her "Reflections" piece. This method is addictive!

Cheryl decided to leave half of her blocks plain and piece only one side.

Anne's "liberated strip piecing" project.

Shirley's "liberated strip piecing" project in the process of being pieced.

Judy's:

Mary Anne's liberated radial design.

Katharine's half-finished liberated radial design.

During my week I had the pleasure of photographing a few amazing sights. This little fox (I think it is a fox) was sitting on the middle of the road having a good scratch when I drove out of the college one day. He retreated to the edge of the woods. This was captured with my cell phone camera, as are most of the photos I share on my blog these days.

So many inspiring classes were taking place around me, and that is one of the aspects of teaching in this venue that I enjoy. Almost across the hall Jay Dampf was teaching his annual "Animals in Art" class, and this little gem by Marian Kujtan was sitting on an easel just outside the classroom. She gave me permission to share her red fox pouncing in the snow. 

In the last year I got in the habit of taking photos with my cell phone while on the road. My DSLR Canon is just too heavy and takes so much space when I'm flying. However, after getting blurry photos of deer the previous week, I hauled out my Canon with mid zoom lens (which I did take with me), and got some very clear photos of the deer near my cottage. 

After witnessing this sight from a distance each day as I drove from cottage to college, I finally figured out where to park to capture it, and was once again thankful to have my zoom lens with me.

There is something about red, isn't there? And while I know they have been done before, and many times, I am facinated by reflections, to the point where I'm considering doing a series on them. However, I'll start by reading up on how painters approach them. But first, I am going to have to update my website, write a newsletter, and figure out how to sell the remaining kits from the classes I taught this spring. There are quite a few blue poppies, a number of red poppies, a couple of peonies and a few hosta kits left. When I have some time I will get them up in the shopping cart on my website and they will be available for a limited time until they are gone. I will post here when they are available. Soon, oh so soon, my vacation will begin :-)

Haliburton School of Art + Design, Summer 2016

Dear Readers,

It is that time of year! Time to register in summer classes at the Haliburton School of Art + Design. Although registration began March 1, there are still a few spaces in my "Serendipity Strips and Curves" class, July 25-29. Registrations are going very well for my "Dyeing to Quilt" class, July 18-22, with just a couple of spaces left. Register soon to avoid disappointment. 

Dyeing to Quilt
Course Number: ARTS1812
Create one-of-a-kind cloth for your quilts while learning several methods of dyeing with Procion MX Fibre Reactive Dyes for natural fibres. You will be introduced to several ways of producing multi-coloured cottons, using both low-water immersion and parfait dyeing methods. Learn to wrap a pole and fold/clamp/stitch fabric to produce shibori-dyed cloth. Prepare and apply resists, such as flour paste and soy wax to create pattern on fabric. Mix thickened dyes to use with resists and to paint designs on your cotton. Learn how to use dyes safely and understand the chemical process involved to ensure your success and safety.

To see what we accomplished in previous classes, just follow all blog posts entitled Dyeing to Quilt, or Dye Happy.

 

Quilting - Serendipity Strips & Curves
Course Number: ARTS1657
Liberate yourself from the shackles of precision piecing and fly by the seat of your pants while producing original quilt designs using free-form strips and curves. You will be introduced to a different method of free-hand cutting and piecing each morning and shown a variety of options for using that method. The rest of the day will be available to cut, sew and work on your construction. Work from the previous day will be addressed for feedback and discussion on composition and design. There will be minimal measuring and little use of rulers!

To see what we accomplished in previous classes, just follow all blog posts entitled Serendipity Strips & Curves

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This last beautiful quilt is made by my student Bev Cooper.

I hope to see you in Haliburton!!

Dye Another Day and Two Sewing Machines

Last Saturday I taught my "Dye Another Day" class for the Ottawa Valley Quilters' Guild. I taught my "Intro to Fabric Dyeing" class for them two weeks prior. Several students returned to the second class with vibrantly-coloured fabric from the first. Smiles all around as they hold up their bundles of fabric.

"Dye Another Day" shares several methods I use for achieving my multi-coloured fabrics. Each student was responsible for mixing up a group of colours, and then everyone rotated around the room using each colour group.

We had a bit of an "oops" when a cup of navy blue dye got bumped over and leaked through to the floor between the tables. Unfortunately, some of it hit Millie's purse. However, students with knees in better shape than mine were quick to clean up the spill. The floor cleaned up beautifully.

I look like a pretty mean teacher with my students on their hands and knees under the table!

Sharron sent me this photograph yesterday of the fabrics from "Dye Another Day" on the left, and "Intro to Fabric Dyeing" on the right. In the middle is the Textile Temptation Pack she also dyed in "Dye Another Day". This exercise gives students the chance to dye a bit of silk-rayon velvet, silk dupioni, silk organza, cotton, and cheesecloth, using the same dye colour. As you can see, each fabric takes the dye a little differently.

This week I started quilting my fern quilt. I find I can only quilt for a few hours and then have to do something else. It is hard on the neck and shoulders. So I set up a second sewing machine to do some strip-piecing. I'm working on updating samples for "Liberated Radial Piecing". Since that class is one of my five one-day classes on free-form cutting and sewing that together form a one week class at Haliburton School of the Arts called "Serendipity Strips and Curves" that is being offered in July, I'm updating a lot of my free-form samples.

It's been great being home for most of December and January and having relaxed time in the studio.

Free-Form Curves

I am really enjoying being home for the month of January and not having a lot of pressing deadlines. So I've just finished dyeing 32 meters of blues, blues/purples, and purples in preparation for upcoming teaching travels. Half of them are soaking in a cold water soak, and the other half has been washed out and is drying on the line in my basement.

The other thing I've been enjoying doing is updating class samples. It is fun to make things using the methods I teach, without any pressure to make something that is show worthy. So in the last couple of days I've turned out two little samples for my "Free-Form Curves" class. I intend to make new samples for all my "free form" classes. Each is a one day class, and I teach all five methods in my week-long "Serendipity Strips & Curves" class at Haliburton School of the Arts.

The two little samples I made were inspired by this photograph I took at Antelope Canyon, Arizona. I was not expecting the pieces to look like this, but rather be an abstraction of what I see there, and I also wanted the colours to be inspired by this photo.

The first piece I turned out looks like this. I wasn't totally happy with the orange ending up to the left and right of the yellow, but I'm not unhappy with the piece. It's just that the result isn't quite what I envisioned.

Such is the nature of free-form piecing. One has to be open to what one gets to a certain extent. In my second piece, I addressed the orange on both ends of the yellow by making the orange more central.  I'm happier with this one.

I've also been experimenting with cutting tree bark for tree collages, using my Brother ScanNCut. I learned a lot during that exercise that I am going to share in my next blog post.

Oh, and remember the negative shapes left when I cut out all the circles for my fern quilt? I've fused them to a multi-coloured hand-dyed fabric, and now I'm going to cut it up and play at a design. However, it does make me happy looking at it just the way it is.

An Inspiring Week of Serendipity at Haliburton School of the Arts

Any time you see photos of deer on my blog, you can pretty much assume I've been teaching at the Haliburton School of the Arts. Last week's class was Serendipity Strips and Curves. The class is about cutting and piecing free-hand without rulers or measurements. It is intended to get students comfortable with free-form and liberated methods of construction, and introduce them to a variety of ways of constructing and designing free-hand.

We started by cutting curves free-hand. This one is Lynne's finished work.

We moved on to cutting curved blocks free-hand, and then designing with them. Once you get a stack of these blocks made you won't get any sleep because the design possibilities are endless. I encouraged Korleen to cut her blocks rectangular instead of square. I like the result.

Libby delved into her hand-dyed fabrics (from last Fall's "Dyeing to Quilt" class), as well as batiks and hand-painted fabrics to turn out this diagonal design.

Bill decided to work with his Tanzanian batiks, and add a few surprise turns into the design.

Tuesday night was the faculty reception at Rail's End Gallery. Each Tuesday night during the Summer School, there is a reception at the Gallery so students can meet instructors. All instructors are encouraged to submit a work for the show. This year I sent "Invitation".

 

 The class really got creative learning how to build free-form curves on a muslin foundation. 

Lynne: 

Liz: 

Korleen:

Susan:

This was a piece I started demo'ing on, and then finished to submit for the art auction on August 7. Proceeds from the auction go to student scholarships. This would be "Femmes FATales 4"

Students learned a method of free-form strip piecing, and how to design and construct with it. Bill started the wonderful trend of hanging these works on the classroom window. They glowed like stained glass!

Bill's window on left, Lynne's on right.

Libby's finished piece

I want to call Susan's piece "Shards"

Holly:

Liz's piece is reminiscent of chocolate, butterscotch and sherbet!

Each day I provided a demo, and then the class sewed and designed all day. Some chose to sew in the evening as well!

Here's the group shot. Back row, L to R, Libby, Lynne, Holly, Bill, Sherri, Susan, and Korleen. Front row, L to R, me, Liz, and Sheila. About half of the students were return students.

The last assignment was to form a radial design with free-hand cutting and sewing.

This lovely spring palette was created by Liz.

Lynne managed to finish hers.

 Sheila successfully combined the two halves of her radial design with the strip-pieced design from the previous day.

I realize now that I missed taking photos of some works that were not prominently displayed.

It is always wonderful to spend a week with such an inspiring and adventurous group of students! I am back home now with some catching up to do in the next two weeks before I head off to teach in the Okanagan Valley.